eMUSIC INDABA 2010

• Festival Curator
  Jürgen Bräuninger
  
• Festival Co-Curator
  Fiona Tozer
  
• Concert Organiser
  Mandy Wilken
  
  +2731 260 3353

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eMUSIC INDABA 2010

Two evenings of electroacoustic music and three days of workshops for young South African composers and performers

In the decade-long tradition of New Music Indabas, the musical creations/presentations and the workshops/master classes of eMusic Indaba will be very educational and will broaden the acoustic horizons of local practitioners and students as well as a general audience. Concert audiences and local electroacoustic performers and composers will be exposed to current global developments in electronic and computer music.

Two emerging South African composers — Angie Mullins and Daniel Hutchinson — have been commissioned to create new works for what is essentially an international platform.

Previously disadvantaged composers and electronic musicians as well as instrumentalists and vocalists will share ideas and establish bonds through their common workshop experiences with relation to electronic composition, improvisation, and performance. The skills honed at the workshops together with the increased experience of a broader musical repertoire will help the participants to realize their full potential and enrich the local music communities.

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SPONSORS

NewMusicSA acknowledges the kind support of:

• University of KwaZulu-Natal
• SAMRO Endowment for the National Arts
• Business and Arts South Africa
• ProHelvetia
• Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands
• School of the Art Institute of Chicago
• Fonds Podium Kunsten NL
• Glenwood Village Music
• Distell Foundation

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WORKSHOPS INVITATION

The workshops are open to all composers, electronic musicians, as well as instrumentalists.

Kindly download the eMusic Indaba 2010 Brochure PDF, and send your completed application form to Jürgen Bräuninger at , or to:

Fiona Tozer
P O Box 1154
Linkhills
3652

Please apply before 20 August 2010.

Limited bursaries are available to assist applicants who need to travel to Durban.

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FEATURING

Composers and performers featured in concerts, workshops and masterclasses include:

• Jürgen Bräuninger (DE/ZA) info
• Nicolas Collins (US) info
• Daniel Hutchinson (ZA)
• Max E. Keller (CH) info
• Rüdiger Meyer (ZA) info
• Angie Mullins (ZA)
• POW Ensemble (NL/ZA) info
• Petra Ronner (CH) info
• Ulrich Süsse (DE/ZA) info
• Dimitri Voudouris (GR/ZA) info
• Pierre-Henri Wicomb (ZA) info

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NICOLAS COLLINS

New York born and raised, Nicolas Collins studied composition with Alvin Lucier at Wesleyan University, worked for many years with David Tudor, and has collaborated with numerous soloists and ensembles around the world. He lived most of the 1990s in Europe, where he was Visiting Artistic Director of Stichting STEIM (Amsterdam), and a DAAD composer-in-residence in Berlin. Since 1997 he has been editor-in-chief of the Leonardo Music Journal, and since 1999 a Professor in the Department of Sound at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. The second edition of his book, Handmade Electronic Music – The Art of Hardware Hacking, was published by Routledge in 2009. Collins has the dubious distinction of having played at both CBGBs and the Concertgebouw.

www.nicolascollins.com

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POW ENSEMBLE

• Sazi Dlamini (Durban, RSA) Special guest – umakhuweyane, umqangala, mbira, flutes, voice and percussion
• Erik Bosgraaf (NL) – recorders, live electronics
• Guy Harries (UK) – voice, flute, computer
• DJ DNA (NL) – turntables, computer
• Luc Houtkamp (NL) – computer, live electronics
• Ard Heinkens (NL) – sound design

The POW Ensemble, founded in 2001 by Dutch composer/saxophonist Luc Houtkamp, is a chamber ensemble of the 21st century, using live electronics and computers as musical instruments. The ensemble has a unique powerful sound and an uncompromising approach. The ensemble is internationally renowned for its approach to present electronic music to the audience in a comprehensive way.

Computer music is often thought of as incomprehensible sounds that nobody can understand, apart from some freaky nerds. POW Ensemble opens up this isolated universe and places it in the centre of the musical world. Thus, a concert by POW ensemble is something completely different: here, real music is being made!

Electronic or computer music is not another style in itself, but can move between different styles and musical traditions, crossing many boundaries. The musicians use improvisation, live processing, interacting with electronic and acoustic instruments such as voice and saxophone. By writing their own software, a completely unique sound and identity are created.

By connecting computers to interactive networks, not only the musicians but also their instruments react to and interact with each other.

This way, POW Ensemble represents a new, unique force in electronic music.

Guy Harries (computer, voice)

Composer/performer born in Israel (1974), living in London. He studied sonology and composition at the Royal Conservatory in the Hague. He has worked extensively as flutist and vocalist. His current musical work consists mostly of the interactive combination of live electronics and acoustic instruments. His compositions were broadcast and performed in various venues around the world. He was winner of the Henriette Bosmans prize of the Association of Dutch composers (GeNeCo) for the year 2000.

He collaborated with musician Meira Asher in the programme Infantry (performance and album), and with ensembles in Europe as performer of live-electronics. His compositions have been performed by contemporary ensembles such as: Tate Ensemble, SOIL and LOOS. At the moment he is studying for a PhD in electro-acoustic composition with Simon Emmerson in London. He is also a singer-songwriter, practising electronic troubadourism with his laptop and voice.

Luc Houtkamp

Luc Houtkamp (1953) is a composer/saxophonist who bridges the gap between the worlds of jazz-derived free improvisation and computer-based composition and performance. As a virtuoso saxophonist he has worked extensively in improvised music, collaborating with numerous musicians and groups all over the world. Since the mid-eighties he has also been working in the field of computer music, mostly by writing his own interactive music software. By establishing his own computer group POW Ensemble in 2001, Houtkamp has created a new platform for exploring and expanding the musical potentials of the computer. In 2004 Houtkamp was awarded the VPRO/Boy Edgar Prijs, the most prestigious award in the field of jazz and improvised music in the Netherlands.

Erik Bosgraaf

Hailed as one of the most gifted and versatile recorder players of the new generation, Erik Bosgraaf has a colourful past in a rock band and as an oboe player. He believes that good music is irrespective of style and feels equally at home in early and contemporary music as well as commissioning new works including several concertos incorporating new media. In 2007 Frans Brüggen invited him to perform Bach's Actus Tragicus at the Concertgebouw. His début recording, a 3-CD box with music by Dutch composer Jacob van Eyck, was number one in the Dutch classical music charts in 2007 and his CD/DVD 'Big Eye', including contemporary music for film, was hailed as 'wacky, irreverent and thought-provoking' (Gramophone). In 2006 he co-founded Ensemble Cordevento specializing in the music of the 17th and 18th century.

DNA

DNA started his musical carrier end 70's. Mid eighties he formed together with, amongst others, guitarist René van Barneveld and rapper Rudeboy the 'Urban Dance Squad'. UDS played at all important pop festivals over the world, and is regarded as one of the most influential and interesting groups in Dutch pop history.

After his cooperation with UDS ended, he has worked as a studio musician and producer. In 1997, he joined the Urban Dance Squad again. February 2000, UDS stopped playing definitively.

Apart from working with POW, DNA has played with Palinckx for some years. He is currently playing with alternative pop-group Stuurbaard Bakkebaard and works as a producer. He is a teacher at the HKU in turntablism as well.

Sazi Dlamini

Sazi Dlamini has composed and recorded more than fifty original pieces of music employing self-made, indigenous Nguni and other African musical instruments. His works and collaborations to date include Inkwishi – a work for jazz big band in the maskandi style, Yinkosi Yeziziba and Jiwe for a string quartet, ugubhu bow and percussion (with Jürgen Brauninger), Destiny (with Ndikho Xaba and Madala Kunene) and Technodiaspora: An Internet Master Class Performance (with George E. Lewis, Douglas Ewart, J.D. Parran, Ndikho Xaba and Madala Kunene) and soundtrack for documentary films, children's educational TV, dance and theatre.

Please see the special YouTube.com site for this project:
www.youtube.com/user/Ikhayaonwoodenshoes

Videos of the musicians:

• Sazi Dlamini
  www.youtube.com/user/Ikhayaonwoodenshoes#p/u/6/FAXj2P5sPy0
• Eric Bosgraaf:
  www.youtube.com/user/Ikhayaonwoodenshoes#p/f/7/gaPJWV-c0lc
• DJ DNA:
  www.youtube.com/user/Ikhayaonwoodenshoes#p/a/f/4/1tIStmb1hL8
• Guy Harries:
  www.youtube.com/user/Ikhayaonwoodenshoes#p/f/0/eDki0luAVbk
• Luc Houtkamp:
  www.youtube.com/user/Ikhayaonwoodenshoes#p/f/13/L3dRbKNcCk4
  www.youtube.com/user/Ikhayaonwoodenshoes#p/f/8/pn2ZFVRNYi0

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PETRA RONNER: SOUTH AFRICAN AND SWISS MUSIC FOR PIANO AND ELECTRONICS

Petra Ronner is a pianist and sound-artist based in Zürich, Switzerland. She appears as soloist and chamber musician, improviser and composer. She is involved in artistic video- and sound projects in the context of art and theatre and is running the concert series www.gnombaden.ch. Recent concerts included John Cage’s Sonatas and Interludes for prepared piano, Stockhausen’s Kontakte for tape, piano and percussion, Schönberg’s Pierrot Lunaire and new works by contemporary composers at Festspiel+ München, TonArt Bern, Taktlos and Tage für Neue Musik Zürich. Recordings at www.vexer.ch. Petra Ronner is presently developing new works for piano and electronics with composers and improvisers in South Africa and Europe.

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PROGRAMME

Download eMusic Indaba 2010 Concerts Programme PDF.

Contact Mandy Wilken +2731 260 3353 for any further information.

Programme navigation:

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Day 1
Thursday 23 September

WELCOME, KEYNOTE ADDRESS / PRESENTATION BY NIC COLLINS

10h00 | BM Room, School of Music

NIC COLLINS WORKSHOP

11h00 | Studio Live Room | 2 hrs

WORKSHOPS WITH MEMBERS OF POW

11h00 | Seminar Room | 1 hr

12h00 | Seminar Room | 1 hr

Extended techniques, compositional resources, and improvisational techniques. Individual follow-ups possible on Saturday morning.

DJ'ING: DJ DNA

14h00 | DJ Room | 3 hrs

Individual follow-ups possible on Saturday morning.

WORKSHOPS WITH MEMBERS OF POW

14h00 | Seminar Room | 1 hr

15h00 | Seminar Room | 1 hr

Extended techniques, compositional resources, and improvisational techniques. Individual follow-ups possible on Saturday morning.

NIC COLLINS CONCERT

18h00 | Howard College Theatre

PETRA RONNER CONCERT: PIANESSENCE — WORKS FOR PIANO AND ELECTRONICS

20h30 | Howard College Theatre

PIANESSENCE
works for piano and electronics

Petra Ronner's repertoire covers piano music from 1600 to the present. Often the piano is a partner in dialogue with one other solo instrument or with sung or spoken voice. It also concentrates on technically extended fields where the piano is treated purely as a medium of the colour of sound as in Impressionism, or a percussion and noise instrument – be it through preparation or playing inside the instrument's body. It is a logical step to move to the extension of the instrument through electronic means to increase structural and material possibilities of the instrument.

In 2006 Petra spent two month at Wits University in Johannesburg as part of the MAPS programme working on a public soundscape project. The resulting sound-pieces were displayed in a modern South African jukebox and shown at blank projects in Cape Town (my ear in your soup, dec/jan 2006/07).

PIANESSENCE grew as a collaborative project working towards new pieces for piano and electronics looking at a fusion of concert oriented piano music and sound installation involving a pianist. The liaison office of the Swiss arts council Pro Helvetia in South Africa offered a residency to explore the field of electronics in contemporary composition. Petra visited Johannesburg, Durban and Cape Town early this year where ideas for new pieces were discussed and sketched. In the meantime Dimitri Voudouris, Jürgen Bräuninger, Ulrich Süsse, Pierre-Henri Wicomb and Angie Mullins have contributed new works.

The PIANESSENCE pool of pieces also features existing and new works by Annesly Black (Berlin), Gary Berger (Zürich), Mario Davidovsky (Argentinia/USA), Luc Ferrari (France), Theo Herbst (Stellenbosch), Thomas Kessler (Toronto/Basel), Alvin Lucier (Middletown, Conn.), Heinz Marti (Zürich), Rüdiger Meyer (Johannesburg/Copenhagen), Germán Toro-Pérez (Bogotà/Austria), and Alfred Zimmerlin (Zürich).

The order of the pieces will be announced at the concert

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Day 2
Friday 24 September — Heritage Day (Public Holiday)

LIVE ELECTRONICS WORKSHOPS WITH POW

10h00 | Howard College Theatre

Featuring the first performance of:

PIANO MASTER CLASS WITH PETRA RONNER

14h00 | School of Music | 3 hrs

NIC COLLINS WORKSHOP CONTINUED

14h00 | School of Music | 3 hrs

POW CONCERT: EKHAYA ON WOODEN SHOES OR THE ADVENTURES OF JOSEF BREZELBACKER

19h30 | Howard College Theatre

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Day 3
Saturday 25 September

COMPOSERS WORKSHOP WITH BRÄUNINGER, COLLINS, HOUTKAMP, LOVEDAY, RONNER, SÜSSE, TOZER

09h00 | Bongani Mthethwa Room, School of Music

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Presented by NewMusicSA - The International Society for Contemporary Music, South African Section
www.iscm.org